1972 Ford F-100 - Old Green, The Giving Machine

Hmmmm … a truck is a part of the family, really? Well, for a lot of us that’s exactly what it is! Our trucks have driven us through some good and bad times in our lives, and for the Dennis family it has been no different. Paul Dennis bought this used ’72 Ford F-100 34 years ago at his local Ford dealership. It had 36,000 miles and he paid $1,800 for it (what a difference 34 years makes.) The truck was used as a daily driver for many years and back in the days before seatbelts were used his sons Brad and Keith used the dash as their own personal teething toys; that dash helped both boys cut their teeth, good ol’ padded dashes! The truck has a huge place in the Dennis family’s memory bank. In the early ’80’s, with $150 in his pocket, Paul took the family on a 500-mile roundtrip camping trip to Pigeon Forge, Tennessee. They borrowed a slide-in camper and off they went. Even without much money the trip was a ton of fun for the family.

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In the late ’90’s the truck was in need of some major TLC. Brad, Paul’s oldest son, was restoring his own ’53 F-100 and thought Old Green should be restored back to its glory. After all, he and his brother Keith both learned to drive in that truck. They started both trucks in 2002, but with some medical setbacks the build got put on hold three times. The first was due to a triple bypass for Paul; the next time was when Keith gave one of his kidneys to Paul, who needed a kidney transplant; and after all that, Paul had a total hip replacement. Talk about some rough years, but through it all Paul said the truck build helped him through it. He would go to the garage so sick that he could barely stand it but it also got his mind off of what he was going through. With the support of his wife, Brenda, and sons Brad and Keith, Paul is doing well health-wise and has finished the build. Old Green has earned a special place in the Dennis family and every few years a man from out of town would stop by and offer to buy the family Ford but Paul couldn’t let it go no matter what price he offered.

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I think the real important part, or moral if you will, was the amount of energy and determination given by both sons to rebuild Old Green with their father. Just to see their dad drive the truck in its current post-surgery state has put a smile on the whole family’s face. CT